You should read this for 2/22/2019:
Art and Film
Books, Writing, and Language
This Chrome extension lets you learn a new language by watching Netflix
. Language Learning with Netflix is a Chrome extension that lets you watch shows with two subtitles on at the same time so you can visually pair translations with dialogue and learn some new vocabulary in the process. It’s a clever service that makes use of Netflix’s massive catalog and all of the major languages in which it already offers subtitles, including Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish.
Where Do New Languages Come From?
The WPA’s horseback librariansThe WPA’s horseback librarians
H/T Beth: How Humans Invented Writing — Four Different Times
H/T Patrick: Nora Roberts on serial plaigirist Cristiane Serruya: Plagiarism, Then And Now
Cristiane Serruya, a self-published ‘writer’ based in Brazil seems to have made a living stealing from actual writers. In this case, a reader again (it’s always a reader, and bless you every one) contacted Courtney Milan, a successful romance writer, a smart woman with a strong spine–and a lawyer, to tell her she’d been plagiarized. If you want to know more about this, check out Courtney’s blog–she lays it out really well.
Education
University police warn students to be on the lookout for a helicopter mom
Food and Drink
Himalayan Salt Is Just Salt, But Pink
Soak Your Beans in the Fridge for Faster Meal Prep
H/T Jeff: Some of Portland’s Best Chefs Go Sober “Drugs and booze nearly gutted a generation of Portland’s best chefs. Now they’re setting the table for sober kitchen culture.”
The Last Word, Your First Cocktail Choice
The key to the drink is Green Chartreuse, a French herbal liqueur with a history even more colorful than the cocktail. The original recipe was created in 1605, intended as a medicinal elixir. Today, the spirit is made from 130 plants, the identity of which are only known by two of the Carthusian monks of La Grande Chartreuse, which makes it one of the most closely guarded secrets in the spirits world”
History and Archaeology
Researchers Use AI to Discover Evidence of Unknown Human Ancestor In Our DNA
Last summer, a team of researchers found a bone fragment in Russia that belonged to a child conceived by a Neanderthal mother and Denisovan father. This remarkable finding suggested that not only were Homo sapiens interbreeding with Neanderthals and Denisovans, but these two species were also interbreeding with one another. This discovery appeared to point to the hypothetical missing third species that could account for the inexplicable parts of the modern human genome. The obstacle geneticists faced was to map not only Neanderthal and Denisovan interbreeding, but also interbreeding between Homo sapiens and a Neanderthal-Denisovan hybrid.
H/T Beth: The Lost World of the Maya is Finally Emerging From the Jungle
Tim Clarkson: Tintagel and the Battle of Camlann
The Lab Discovering DNA in Old Books “Even the beeswax used in seals is rich with data about the past, including the flowers that grew in that region year to year”
Sarah Fiddyment, a postdoctoral research fellow working with Collins, shadowed conservationists for several weeks. She saw that they used white Staedtler erasers to clean the manuscripts, and wondered whether that rubbed off enough DNA to do the trick. It did; the team found a way to extract DNA and proteins from eraser crumbs, a compromise that satisfied everyone.
They should have included Michael Drout.
Science and Nature
This Scary Map Shows How Climate Change Will Transform Your City You can find the interactive climate change map here.
Opportunity did not answer NASA’s final call, and it’s now lost to us
And yet from that moment on, Opportunity and its sister rover Spirit began plugging along the surface of Mars. Originally designed for 90-day lifetimes, the rovers persisted. Spirit lasted until 2010, when its batteries were unable to keep the spacecraft’s critical components from freezing. But Opportunity kept on keeping on amidst the harsh terrain. It roved a staggering 45.16 kilometers across the Red Planet, a distance unmatched by any rover on the Moon or Mars. In 2016, as it climbed a hill, Opportunity’s tilt reached 32 degrees, the steepest ever for any rover on Mars.
H/T Bronwen: World’s largest bee, missing for 38 years, found in Indonesia
Society
Grand Canyon tourists exposed for years to radiation in museum building, safety manager says
Technology
Hackers keep trying to get malicious Windows file onto MacOS
Google, Apple Called Out For Hosting Saudi Government App That Allows Men To Track Their Spouses’ Movements
Now available: Kashmir Hill’s final Good Bye Big Five article on blocking all 5 tech giants: Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft:
A couple of months ago, I set out to answer the question of whether it’s possible to avoid the tech giants. Over the course of five weeks, I blocked Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Apple one at a time, to find out how to live in the modern age without each one.
To end my experiment, I’m going to see if I can survive blocking all five at once.
Women’s Work
The Post-it wall outside Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s office got so big she had to move it
Michelle Obama just shared a glorious text exchange with her mom from Grammys night
💩🔥💰 Trumpery 💩🔥💰
If Trump Declares An Emergency To Build The Wall, Congress Can Block Him
